Madame Secretary

 I was the recording secretary of the Philadelphia Phantoms Phan Club for at least the final 6 years of the team's tenure in Philly. So when Mark and I recently joined the Philadelphia Flyers Fan Club, I found it novel to be sitting in on a meeting and NOT taking minutes.

Well, that lasted all of three meetings, lol. Last month, at our second meeting, they were nominating new officers. The existing recording secretary had to be coaxed to accept the nomination, because no one was offering to take over the position. The actual elections were this month, however.

In order to run for office, a member has to have attended three meetings. They said that if the April meeting is someone's third meeting, they technically could offer to run and be elected in the same day. So I reached out on FB to the President of the club, explained who I am and my experience level, and said that April's meeting would be my third one. Therefore, if the current recording secretary didn't want to continue, I offered to take the position.

Long story short, that worked out well. So I will be the recording secretary for the PFFC, starting next season. We have a summer break from meetings, though there are social events happening, and then in the fall, I will start as recording secretary. So feel free to address me as Madame Secretary, lol. 😄

Meanwhile, the DynaWrite brownies are on hold. The device has decided to have some issues with powering on, and as long as that continues, I can't access any of the files on the device. I will keep trying.

DynaWrite Brownies

 I have a collection of various and sundry distraction-free devices on which I like to write. Basically they are non-internet-connected word processors, and there is quite a variety of these things to choose from.

I picked up a DynaWrite last week from eBay. When it arrived, I saw that it still has some old files on it. The first one I saw is a recipe for brownies. 

I got some USB sticks, and I am going to migrate the files onto a thumb drive so I can clear out the device and start fresh.

But even though I'm not a baker, I might just try making the brownies, for the heck of it. 😄 I think I'll call them DynaWrite Brownies.

The Week from Purgatory

 Welcome to my week from purgatory.

Last Saturday, another unauthorized withdrawal was made from our bank. The NEW account, that we created because the OLD ones were compromised, was hit.

We now have multiple kinds of flag on our bank accounts, including the ones that were not affected, so that (among other things) the teller must ask for a password before allowing a withdrawal. (All three of our account compromises involved teller withdrawals, done in Alabama where neither Mark nor I have ever set foot. If it happens again, the next meeting we have at the bank branch will involve pulling our money out of the bank entirely.

I have had to deal with a crapped-out SIM card, so my phone was not working for most of Wednesday. Fortunately, a new SIM card resolved the issue.

I have had various and sundry forms of digestive distress all week, and this is WITH the truckload of prescriptions and OTC remedies I take religiously. Pain and multiple types of incessant organ recitals are involved, and I am getting tired of feeling like this. I was at the doctor a few days ago, and we think it was a norovirus that's going around. Sadly there aren't norovirus-specific remedies out there, other than just medicating the symptoms and waiting it out.

And some of my prescription refills were held up by Prior Auth issues, because medical insurance in this country is a royal pain in various unmentionable parts of the anatomy. It won't be fully straightened out until Monday at the earliest, so here I am dealing with symptoms because I am out of a couple of meds. (This is separate from the digestive distress mentioned above.)

I'm about ready to spit fire. Calgon, take me away.

Two Decades of Blogging

 I am thinking about the fact that in May, I will have had this blog for 20 years. 

I will have to celebrate on that day. I'm not sure how, but I am going to do it!

I also am this-close to my 3,000th post. Maybe I should schedule my posts such that I hit 3,000 on the same day as the anniversary.

Decisions, decisions. 😊

Freakin' Rona

 Well, this is going to be a relaxing vacation week, possibly a tad quieter than we had anticipated. We are isolating for 5 days. Mark took a side trip to Urgent Care this morning, where they confirmed that his at-home COVID tests were accurate. Blah. Paxlovid is in the house.

I have no symptoms and have not tested. But I will isolate anyway, to make sure that I am not handing out copies of any germs to anybody. I will definitely test prior to returning to work next week, unless I have symptoms that inspire me to test sooner than that. If I test positive at any point prior to next week, I will ask my manager about working from home for however long I need to isolate. Unless I get deathly sick, I see no reason to not work from home. I am sure a ton of electronic documents will be coming in all week. By January 3, I expect that there will be no shortage of emails for me to process, and I can do that remotely.

For what it's worth, Mark didn't test positive, either, until about two days after symptom onset. He tested negative on Christmas Eve, which was when the coughing started. So even if I ran and did a test right now, it might not show anything anyway.

Fug this virus. Seriously. Nobody needs it at any time, but we really could have done without it right now. We had some holiday-week things that we were looking forward to, that are now off the table for safety reasons.

Fortunately, we are both up-to-date with boosters, so I hope that will help keep the symptoms mild. And we do have lots of chicken soup in the house. :) My former boss (who is Jewish himself) used to call chicken soup "Jewish penicillin", lol. We will help keep Campbell's and Progresso in business for the next few days, along with various food delivery services.☺

Kitty Tunnel Follies

I have two black cats. Merlin is petite at 9.5 lbs. Houdini is huge at 15.7 lbs. We have three cloth kitty tunnels, cloth tubes with a wire framework that allows them to stay open all the time, because Houdini is OBSESSED with them. If you wonder where he is, wander around to the kitty tunnels and chances are, there will be a black kitty hiney protruding from the end of one. He goes halfway in, and considers himself hidden. lol. I won't tell him that his stealth leaves something to be desired, if you won't. One of the tunnels lives near the foot of the stairs leading to the second floor, and if I head in that direction, Houdini will come speeding over to hide in it, so he can get his share of tickles and skritches as I walk past.

I was about to walk past a kitty tunnel en route to going upstairs. A black kitty hiney was protruding from the tunnel. Plot twist: Houdini came running to take his place in the tunnel, so it was actually Merlin whose rump was protruding from the tunnel this time!

Houdini, clearly flummoxed that his brother was in his spot, emphatically sniffed Merlin’s rump. Merlin refused to budge. Houdini tried entering the other end of the tunnel. Merlin refused to budge.

Houdini took his massive, chonktastic self and pounced on the half of the tunnel where Merlin was. Merlin came charging out the other end of the tunnel like a furry cannonball.

Houdini promptly installed himself halfway into the tunnel, in the spot Merlin had vacated, with his hiney protruding.As far as he was concerned, all was right with the world.

I have spoiled cats!

That was unexpected!

 To make a very long story short, I wound up subscribing to a background check site for 3 days of unlimited usage. I had to find a person whose name was on a piece of mail that my mom got at her address, and I thought this was the most expedient way to figure out where the mail should go. The person actually lives across the street from my mom, as the person addressing the envelope messed up while writing the house number. So that mystery was solved quickly.

However, here I am with three days of a subscription to this search site.

And I thought about what might have happened to the person who I broke up with in college, whose behavior in the aftermath would qualify as stalking if someone did those things today. Sadly, anti-stalking laws didn't get passed until 3 or 4 years after my graduation, so he wasn't doing anything illegal at the time.  

For obvious reasons, I have made a point of NOT having contact with this guy in the decades since graduation. I have also made a point of trying to minimize identifying info that might crop up in search engines, specifically so it would be less easy for this specific person to drop my name in a search and decide to start his antics again. I was hoping that he was happily married and moved far, far away, where he would not have an reason to start any further trouble here.

But what I found is that he died last year. THAT wasn't what I expected to see. I found the obituary, which contained the memories that his sister wrote, and I saw his birthdate. I am 100% positive that this is the person I knew back then.

I am a bit shocked, as he was only a few years older than I am. I don't know what info I expected to find, but this wasn't it. 

At least I never again have to be concerned about whether something will trigger him to start making trouble again. That has always been in the back of my mind for the past 38 years, more than half my life. When the shock wears off, I suppose I will feel relief.

New E-Bike

 I ordered an electric bike a while ago via Indegogo. It arrived on Friday. Mark was kind enough to make sure he was at the house when the FedEx arrived, and he also took care of the minimal amount of assembly that was needed to get the bike ready to go.

I took it for a spin today. I spent about an hour and a half riding all over the neighborhood, since there is very little traffic in most of the streets here. We have a few state highways on the perimeter of the neighborhood, but for the most part, the residential streets are quiet. I even went past the house where our late, much-missed friend Joan used to live. I saluted the house as I went past. I still think about how glad I am that she met Mark before she passed. 

I'm considering surprising my mom with a visit one of these days, provided I can get back on the road for home before the sun starts going down. My night vision is improved, now that I know about the dry eye syndrome and use eyedrops daily, but the cataracts are still there so I'm still not too sure about driving any sort of vehicle after dark.

Freakin' nutria!

 An online friend of mine is awaiting humane traps because there is a sizeable rodent in their house. Her story reminded me of something that happened to me years ago, during my commute home from work. I promptly recounted my story:

 

I  am reasonably sure I saw a nutria years ago, on a subway-surface trolley platform. (SEPTA has some trolley lines that run underground for part of their route, and on the street for the rest.) I didn't know nutrias existed at that time, but what I did know was I was looking at a cat-sized rodent. I thought it was a rat, and was momentarily astonished that "rat the size of a cat" was not an exaggeration.

 

Being the skilled decibel-generator that I am, I proceeded to exclaim "HOLY SH*T" loudly enough to drown out a jet engine.

 

EVERYONE remaining on the platform turned to stare. None of them had seen the rodent, which had promptly made itself scarce when the Very Loud Human became very loud.

 

I asked the staring people, "Did you SEE that rat? It was so big, it should have paid a fare!" And whoever remained on the platform either decided to either Walk Quickly Away Like Nothing Happened, or stare at me with pity because as everyone could plainly see, there was no rat on the platform.

 

Freakin' nutria! Making me look even more nuts than I already am! 😂😂

Distraction-free writing

 I have jumped back into the "distraction-free writing" arena. My most popular articles on Medium were the ones that discussed various forms of tech where you can just sit down and write, with no distractions from the internet, incoming messages, various popups, and so on.

As such, I invested in one upcoming device that should be hitting the market next summer. I already have, and have reviewed, another device from that same manufacturer, Astrohaus. But because I'm me, I also managed to find a reasonably-priced version of an AlphaSmart Neo2 on eBay, which is a device made about 20ish years ago, and bought that, too.

Now I just have to build writing into my daily schedule. 😀

Of all the times..!

 Of all the times for me to forget to take the post-gallbladder-surgery medication, I had my brain-lock moment yesterday. 

Months ago, I went to a GI doc and got a med that helps with post-gallbladder-removal intestinal rebellion. I got fed up with the bouts of being jet-propelled, and made the appointment. The good news: it works VERY well! The other news: if I miss my daily dose, it takes 3 or 4 days for my intestines to calm themselves back down. After discerning this via trial and error, or really just error, I have been extra-careful to take that med every day.

Yesterday, however, was not a normal day. I went with Mark so he could have his colonoscopy. All was well, and he can wait ten years for the next one. But I somehow forgot to medicate at lunchtime yesterday, and I am living to regret that mistake today. 

Considering that the side effects of the Ozempic also cause a person to become jet-propelled, I fear there are going to be a lot of organ recitals in the next few days. Talk about "May you live in interesting times", lol.

New Health Regimen

I started a new medication last Monday. It's a once-weekly injectable. Yes, you saw right: injectable. I, the biggest needle-phobe you are likely to ever know, am willing to try an injectable medication if it means fixing the direction in which my a1c and weight were trending.

 

I am not diabetic, and I would like to continue to be able to say that, so I had a long talk with the doctor about options. I am already tracking calories like it's going out of style, and I was doing lots of calorie-burning until the swimming pools all closed and Bell's palsy happened. But the fact of the matter is that some of my existing meds, which I absolutely need to continue taking, can make shedding pounds more difficult.

 

So, bearing all this in mind, I broached the topic with my doctor about what additional things I can do, and this injectable med was on the list of options.

You KNOW I am motivated to make the extra pounds go away if I would even consider, for one moment, anything that involved needles.

 

I took it for the first time last Monday. I could barely look at the needle part of the apparatus, but I took it. And I am already down 4 pounds since then. Wow. 

 

I will keep doing the other things I have been doing, of course. But I think this is going to help me get results that have, overall, been rather difficult to achieve so far.

Gilda Radner was right. It's always something.

In the immortal words of the late, lamented Gilda Radner, "It's always something." That's a good way to describe this weekend.

First, Mark got the same kind of error message on his dashboard about his transmission that he was getting about a month ago. He has an appointment with Ford, but not until the second week of September. We are back to using my car for All The Things for the time being.

Second, I was out with friends at Marsh Creek when I felt something unusual. We were a combination of deaf and hearing folks, so I made a facial expression (part of ASL) as part of my response to something, and it felt "off". It actually felt like only the right side of my face had moved properly. Hmm. Odd.

Then, last night, I noticed that my left eye wasn't closing all the way. Hmm. VERY odd.

Fast-forward to this morning. There were definitely assymetrical facial movements, with my left side being less responsive.

Fortunately, I knew of the existence of a condition called Bell's Palsy, and felt there was no reason to panic. We went to church, as I interpret on the fourth Sunday of the month, and from there, we went right to Urgent Care.

The doctor agrees that it's Bell's Palsy, which a viral infection that affects one of the facial nerves*, which can take weeks to resolve. But as there is no limb weakness, no lack of mental clarity, no slurring speech, etc., odds are that it is NOT one of the more dire reasons why a person would have asymmetric facial movements. Heck, I spent an hour using sign language at Mass. If there was any issue with my limbs, we can guarantee that I would have noticed it long before Mass was over. All the limbs and all the fingers and toes are doing their jobs properly. 

*Very rarely, in fewer than 1%  of cases, both sides of the face are affected. In most cases, including mine, only one side is impacted.

I did get the COVID test done anyway. Why the heck not? Might as well rule out that any OTHER viruses are intruding on the premises, while we work on getting rid of the source of the Bell's Palsy. Man, that swab up the nose is annoying, lol. But it could be worse.

Long story less long: I have a ten-day course of both Prednisone and an antiviral. I am hoping that since I started treatment within the first 2 hours of having symptoms, maybe the symptom progression won't get too far. The first 48 hours of symptom onset is when things are in the "getting worse before it gets better" stage.

I have a feeling I will be drinking through a straw for a while. This morning, I almost ended up wearing my coffee. That's all I need are MORE reasons why I end up having food and beverage mishaps, lol. I have enough of those on a normal day.

Updates for Blog Day!

 As you can imagine from my previous couple of posts, I have been putting a lot of internal pieces back together. Posting hasn't been crossing my mind. But today is the 19th anniversary of this blog, so I have been planning for a while now to put in a few words today.

Therefore, let me begin by posting some HAPPY news. Yes, happy things still take place around here, and this is a pretty big one. On April 2, we adopted a two-year-old, cat-friendly kitty named Houdini. This is the first time I didn't rename a kitty after adopting them. (Even Misty had a different name, Freckles, in the household in which she was born.) But he just looks like a Houdini, and besides, that name meshes nicely with Merlin's name, meaning I still have a themed pair of kitty names, even though I only named one of them, lol.

Merlin is very gradually warming up to Houdini's presence. He is letting Houdini be in close range of him frequently now, without hissing or growling. However, he still is not at a point where he will play, wrestle, or have Zoomies with Houdini yet. But Houdini is not giving up, so I suspect we are going to see some positive interactions at some point. I will be very happy when I witness that!

As I said, this blog is officially 19 years old today. I can't believe I have had this for nearly two decades. I will have to celebrate wildly a year from now. 😀So Happy Blog Day, everyone!

Heartbreak, Even Worse

 I can't believe how dreadful the past few weeks have been. Pyewacket passed on 02/17, after which I got sick for two days just from the stress and upset.

I got my digestive tract sorted out just in time to accompany my mom to her hand surgery the following week... after which, I started running a fever that maxed out at 100.5. That got me sent to get a COVID test, the PCR test where they swab farther back than you ever thought a Q-tip could be inserted. That tested negative, but it still took a couple days to rebound. (This was my first time with Tamiflu, and it rocked!)

I thought I was going to be able to just lounge on Sunday of that weekend, just to recuperate well enough to return to work on Monday. Nope. Unfortunately, the next round of challenges was about to begin. My poor Mom fell and broke her hip. She wound up admitted to Methodist, having surgery a few days later, and then going to the Watermark for inpatient rehab. The good news is that all her recuperation from that is going as it should. BUT! (Isn't there always a BUT?) they also found a large growth on her pituitary gland. Large, like over an inch in size, on a gland that should be the size of a pea.

While all this was going on, a couple days before she was to be discharged, my Uncle Tony called. My cousin Anthony was back in the hospital, where he has been repeatedly since last June. I would estimate he was hospitalized more than he was at home since Father's Day. It has been that bad. But this time, it was different. Docs had found evidence that his organs were starting to shut down. He was not likely to make it. I had to call the Watermark and break my mother's heart by telling her this news. But that's better than having my uncle have to say it to her. The words were almost physically painful to utter. It's just not right that someone only 50 years old would have been put through such suffering his entire life by a rebellious body. This world is not fair, period.

The Saturday after Mom came home, Uncle Tony called again. (We had left some messages for him, but I think he was just swamped with all that was going on.) Anthony passed away in the wee hours of Saturday morning. I can't even see straight for the grief, if I dwell on it too long. Mind you, after the nine circles of hell that his body put him through, it's not like I would wish him back into that suffering body just for my sake. But I certainly wish his soul had been installed into a body that did not hurt, damage itself, create crises requiring emergency surgery, and rebel at every possible opportunity. He had more surgeries in this past year than most folks have had in a lifetime. It most assuredly is not fair. I know this world is not fair, but sometimes I reserve the right to rail against the worst of the unfairness. This is like that.

His funeral is Friday. Mom can't manage a car ride that long, so soon after her surgery, and I don't blame her. She is upset that she can't go, but I know Uncle Tony of all people will understand.

Next up: we find out when my mother's pituitary surgery is. We already saw the neurosurgeon this week (good appointment) and she had a baseline vision test so they can compare it to her vision post-surgery (not-so-good appointment).

2022 can go jump in a lake. All it had to do, to be welcomed as a hero, would have been to be a better year than its two immediate predecessors. It is, so far, failing spectacularly at meeting even that simple requirement.

Stay Tuned. There is more to come. I hope it's not more of what we have just been through.

Our hearts are broken

       

Pyewacket Momorella

04/19/2018 - 02/17/2022

Pyewacket the Purrball, the most incredibly sweet cat imaginable, was diagnosed with a saddle thrombus (blood clot blocking circulation to his hindquarters).

X-rays and echocardiogram showed severe heart failure. We’d been in ”wait and see” mode almost all his life, as he was diagnosed with a heart murmur while he was still small. Evidently, it had progressed dramatically in the months following his annual physical.

His prognosis was poor even if we were to put him through the rigors of treatment. We couldn’t subject him to that. We chose to assist his transit to the Rainbow Bridge.

He is, and ever will be, deeply loved and missed.

Still Plugging Away

I haven't posted in a few months, but I am hear to update that I am still plugging away. My not-OKness comes and goes. Depression is a part of the grieving process, so I was not surprised when that started cropping up late in 2021. I had a doctor's appointment already scheduled, so I mentioned this to her when I got there. Her recommendations were to take a Vitamin D supplement and get a light therapy lamp. 

As it happens, her suggestion was timely, as two days prior, I had asked Mark for just such a lamp for Christmas. A friend of mine had posted about getting a sunlight lamp on Facebook for seasonal affective disorder, which I already know I deal with at this time of year. I started shopping for one, and then realized that I had not given Mark my suggestion for a Christmas present yet. So I found a good candidate and then sent Mark the link. It's here now, and I think that it has been helpful. 

Later today, my goal is to start migrating non-crafting thing out of my studio, so I can move some items on the first floor INTO the studio. I had set up the smaller spare bedroom as my studio a few years ago, but over time, there has been some mission creep and things that are not about crafting have been stored there. Now, it's time to do some work to get the studio back into shape. Wish me luck.

Thoughts on a side gig

 I have discovered a new way to earn a bit of pin money. It involves clicking the links sent to me by a company whose job is to boost search engine results. Someone pays this company to get Real Humans to click their links on search engine results pages, and if they get enough clicks, the Mysterious Search Engine Algorithms will rank those pages higher.

The company, in turn, uses a browser add=on to register the clicks that we give the links, and pays per click. At the end of the month, they pay directly into PayPal. They are as good as their word. The transaction went through right on the first of this month, my first time being paid by them.

Many of the links being clicked are for businesses. "Personal injury attorney in XYZ City", "Roofers in ABC Town", etc. One particular art studio has been posting individual items of theirs that are for sale. I can see where a company would find it expedient to buy some clicks for their items, so their links will show up in web searches.

Then there are the assignments that I find... intriguing. There are a few names that have been popping up repeatedly, and they are for individual human beings, all rich guys who founded whatever companies they are affiliated with. Their links are leading to sites where glowing articles are written about them, that discuss their philanthropic activities, that describe their various business successes, and so on.

But I noticed something. Interspersed in the search engine results that I am going through, to track down the intended link and click on it, are articles that are... shall we say, not as favorable as the ones we are clicking. Those other headlines discuss bankruptcies, lawsuits, rude things the person has allegedly said or done, and so on.

My educated guess is that the purchaser of these clicks is hoping to make the desirable coverage links be the first things people see when they search on the person's name.

Having said this, I have no idea who is purchasing the clicks. I am aware that there are companies dedicated to cleaning up a person's online brand, and I suspect these individuals are affluent enough to enlist such a company's services.

It's interesting, though, that I have not yet encountered the names of any women taking these steps to enhance their search engine results. Maybe we ladies ought to think in these terms, if we want to be sure that OUR names are the first things people see when they hit up a search engine.

Food for thought.

Roosters

 

Me: (working from home in living room)

Mark: (computing in dining room)

 

Mark: (finds YouTube compilation of crowing roosters)

 

Mark's laptop: COCKADOODLEDOOOO (repeatedly)

 

Me: Are we having fun?

 

Mark: It's crowing roosters!

 

Me: I see! Or rather, I hear!

 

(Rooster video finishes)

 

(silence)

 

Mark: (finds YouTube compilation of cuckoo clocks)

 

Mark's laptop: CUCKOO! (bong) CUCKOO! (bong) (repeatedly)

 

Me: 😳

These Ads Are Killing Me

 Every time I turn around, be it on TV or online, I am encountering another Father's Day ad.

Thank goodness it will only continue for another couple of weeks. The repeated reminders are brutal.

P. S. I did a little date calculating, after discovering that the current version of the Windows 10 calculator has this feature, and discovered that the day on which I was exactly 21,000 days old was also the day of my dad's funeral.